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Rice and Lentils

A simple dish of boiled rice topped with stewed Egyptian lentils, onions, pepper, salt, and butter, served with green vegetables.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Lentils and onion match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,221 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Rice and Lentils

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Boil the rice according to package instructions.

  2. In a pot, stew the lentils with chopped onions, pepper, salt, and butter until well done.

Serve

  1. Place the cooked rice on a serving dish.

  2. Pour the stewed onions and lentils over the rice.

  3. Serve with green vegetables.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Lentils + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,221 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Rice + lentilstop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together256 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Rice + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,433 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Rice + peppertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,379 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Rice
Forms the base of the dish, absorbing the stewed lentils and onions.
Egyptian lentils
Provide the main body and protein of the dish when stewed until soft.
Onion
Softens as it stews, adding sweetness and savory depth to the lentils.
Butter
Adds fat and richness to the stewed lentils and onions.

The step that matters

Stewing the lentils until well done. Lentils need enough time in liquid to soften fully; undercooked lentils stay firm and grainy. Cooking them thoroughly lets their starches gelatinize and the texture become tender.

Swap the lentils

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, onion, pepper, butter):

  1. Black-eyed peafits better
  2. Sesamefits better
  3. Beansfits better
  4. Lentilsthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rice, onion, pepper, butter. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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